Favorite Ink Brands?

[naatelovesyou]

State your favorite brands and colours!!! I love to make my own ink...its just so much fun and takes away from the fact that i dont have real life friends

[J85909266]

Favorite brands:

Noodlers

Pilot

Sailor

 

Favorite Colors:

Black

Blue Black

Blue

Turquoise/Teal/Blue Green

[ink-syringe]

My favorite ink brands are Sailor (probably the best overall) and Montblanc. Surprisingly consistent across the whole brand, surprisingly affordable, good usable everyday colors, safe, and great bottle: Royal Blue, Corn Poppy Red, Toffee Brown, etc. Annoyed by: issue of limited inks being so limited, expensive and hard to find. JFK is better than their regular Blue-black old or new formula (imo) and I would buy it as my go to Blue Black were it not unobtainium and expensive.

 

Also like J. Herbin (actually, mostly dislike but the that I inks I do like, I like quite a lot) and

 

Disappointing: Pilot. Ultimately there are actually surprisingly few Pilot or Iroshizuku inks I love. Though Asa-gao is one of them. Kon-peki too but that is bested by the Sailor offerings in the same part of the spectrum.

 

Mystified by: Pelikan inks. WHY WOULD YOU PUT THAT IN YOUR PEN? </wink>

 

If there were only, for some odd reason, Waterman inks, I think I would be okay. They make a decent blue, black, blue-black, and brown inks but I find their red too bright and rose-colored. Florida Blue is my most used ink since school.

 

Surprised by: Nowadays Sheaffer Skrip. Super cheap. Some good saturated colors. The blue is fine, as is the red and the Blue-Black is actually one of the better BB out there.

[shawndp]

As a brand - Noodler's because I really like Bad Blue Heron and Midway Blue as well as the Baystate's... A lot of Noodler inks come with cool features - the Bad Blue Heron holds up to oil / coolant / gasoline (I work in the car business and service notes need to stay written) and are excellent value for money.

 

As a single colour MB's Midnight Blue is my fav - replaces Aurora Blue as my top ink which in turn took the crown from Waterman South Sea Blue (prior fav). Randomly, I like the purple-pink Platinum cartridge that comes with Preppy pens and also MB's Toffee Brown as contrasting ink for notes.

 

Iroshizuku performs really well and I have a few but can not really pick a favourite. They have some very nice blue's...

 

Finally, I dislike black ink - I have over 30 bottles of ink down from 40-something and only 1 bottle of black (Noodler's Heart of Darkness)

[Notgatherox]

Noodler's and Diamine.

 

The J Herbin 1670 series also.

 

 

~Epic

[AAAndrew]

I'm really liking the Diamine inks I've used, with Blue Velvet (one of the anniversary inks) being my current favorite blue.

Aurora Black

MB Lavendar Purple

Private Reserve Sherwood green

Sailor Epinard.

 

So, you can see I'm not loyal to just one or two brands, but pick and choose the inks that work for me.

 

I only have one Noodlers, the old formula of Galileo, but that will change soon as I just ordered the new Crimson FPN ink.

 

+1 as well on Sheaffer inks. Sheaffer brown, while not a thrill-ride of sheen and shading, is a very well-behaved and safe, solid brown ink.

[ScienceChick]

KWZI, hands down. A huge variety of colors, pen safe IG, and, with very few exceptions, excellent properties/behavior (the purples can be harder to clean out).

 

Colors: Violet #9, IG Turquoise and Brown Pink.

Edited July 1, 2015 by ScienceChick

[Alohamora]

One brand I particularly like that doesn't get much mention is Rohrer and Klingner. It's been consistently good across all the 5 or 6 colors I've tried.

 

Sailor and Montblanc have also been consistently good.

 

Diamine makes some wonderful reds and oranges.

 

Noodler's makes one of my very favorite inks (LE), as well as some of my least liked ink.

 

Pilot, Lamy, Pelikan, Private Reserve also earn some play time in my pens.

Edited June 30, 2015 by Alohamora

[benbot517]

I really like Iroshizuku. it is more expensive, but the colors I have have totally been worth the money. The ink behaves itself nicely, and they are a treat to use.

 

J. Herbin 1670 is another one that I adore. For all the worry about having micro particles clog the feeds on my pens, I've actually never experienced this (even after leaving RH in a pen for too long. New formula, so not as bad from what I hear.), and I actually find that the inks flow quite well.

[torstar]

Aurora black

Herbin's rainbow of blue options

Noodle's the staples of blue, black, green

PR purples

 

I can't go on, this could take 20 minutes...

[The Blue Knight]

I like J herbin the most. As there are few inks I really like made by them.

 

Diamine is good as they are cheap.

 

I would like to see what the hype about these Pilot inks is a Sailor too however I can't bring myself to may much more than £10 a bottle when there are nice Herbin (stormy Grey being the exception) and Diamine inks I have yet to try.

[2n7000]

Diamine Eclipse, Syrah and Sargasso Sea.

 

Aurora Black.

[Water Ouzel]

Mystified by: Pelikan inks. WHY WOULD YOU PUT THAT IN YOUR PEN? </wink>

Pelikan 4001 inks have made one or two of my pens usable. For me.

 

I write fairly small, and a bit slowly; the 4001 slows things down enough that my writing is still legible. Quink may do the same, but I've not opened that bottle yet.

[ancalagon]

R&K, Diamine, Iroshizuku, and Sailor inks have consistently impressed me.

[bbycrts]

Chesterfield! Okay, it's rebranded Diamine, but it's even cheaper...

 

Favorite color: cobalt

Favorite ink overall: Archival Vault - yes, an iron gall ink - I love it!

[inkstainedruth]

My tastes are all over the map. I have more Noodler's inks than anything else, but am starting to build up a collection of Diamine, De Atramentis and KWZI. Plus a few of other brands as well.

But, like Alohamora, one of my least favorite inks on the planet is also Noodler's: La Reine Mauve. Blecch.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[FayeV]

I only started exploring inks a little over a year ago, so have not tried all the brands available.

Brands I have tried: Akkerman, Diamine, J. Herbin, Iroshizuku, Montblanc, Noodler's, Organics Studio, Private Reserve, Rohrer & Klingner, and Waterman.

 

My favorite brands: Rohrer & Klingner and J. Herbin.
I don't think I can go wrong with any of their inks, mainly because they seem consistent across various colors (unlike other brands).

I have to agree with Alohamora who mentioned that R&K hardly ever gets mentioned. I'm not sure why this is, maybe because it isn't one of the "sexy" brands. I have 11 R&K colors, plus 3 more on the way. Absolutely no problems with their ink.

 

My long time favorite color: Waterman South Seas Blue (now renamed to Inspired Blue, I think)

 

Other favorite colors:

J. Herbin Rose Cyclamen (pink!)

Noodler's Apache Sunset (orange yellow)
Noodler's Black Swan in Australian Roses (original version)

Rohrer & Klingner Verdigris (blue gray green)
Montblanc Emerald Green (no longer made)

 

I have one bottle of Iroshizuku Yama-Guru (wild chestnut brown). I purposely chose a color outside my comfort zone and was pleasantly surprised with the color and behavior of this ink. It flows so smoothly. I would not hesitate to add more Iroshizuku inks to my collection when my pocketbook allows it.

[luvpens]

Pelikan 4001 royal blue and MB midnight blue.

 

To be honest, I don't experiment with inks much, but found the above work really well, so stuck with them. The MB in most of my pens gives instant starts even after weeks of non use.

 

I tried one of the Diamine blacks a while back, and the pens would not start if you left them uncapped for more than a minute or two. I was quite disappointed.

[Namru]

I get through more Sailor ink than any other, so Sailor I guess. Sailor inks also still contain phenol, and every time I uncap a pen the smell takes me back to my little English village primary school. No other ink in my drawer can do that.

 

Also, SHEEN.

 

Sailor Grenade is my everyday ink. Practical without being dull.

 

Sailor Sky High and Yama-dori are also used often.

[pajaro]

Montblanc, Sheaffer, Noodler's, Diamine and Waterman are reliable. Pilot "turquoise" is a decent ink.

 

I am stupefied by statements that any of these inks are "cheap." Cheap is Sheaffer's for $0.25 per bottle, as it was in the time I grew up in the 1950s and 1960s. I suppose cheap is relative, and if $9 to sky's the limit is all you know, $9 might seem cheap. Spare me the chatter about inflation.

 

Some inks are a bit dry. You will know them when you try them.

 

I prefer inks with English language nomenclature.